"There is but one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it steadily" – George Washington letter to Edmund Randolph — 1795. We live in a “post-truth” world. According to the dictionary, “post-truth” means, “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” Simply put, we now live in a culture that seems to value experience and emotion more than truth. Truth will never go away no matter how hard one might wish. Going beyond the MSM idealogical opinion/bias and their low information tabloid reality show news with a distractional superficial focus on entertainment, sensationalism, emotionalism and activist reporting – this blogs goal is to, in some small way, put a plug in the broken dam of truth and save as many as possible from the consequences—temporal and eternal. "The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it." – George Orwell “There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.” ― Soren Kierkegaard

Daily Archives: April 2, 2020

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.—1 John 1:9.

THERE may be some confessions we need to make to be brought into close fellowship with God. We must coöperate with God. You may take a bottle and cork it up tight, and put it under Niagara, and not a drop of that mighty volume of water will get into the bottle. If there is any sin in my heart that I am not willing to confess and to give up, I need not expect a blessing. The men who have had power with God in prayer have always begun by confessing their sins. Take the prayers of Jeremiah and Daniel. We find Daniel confessing his sin, when there isn’t a single sin recorded against him.[1]

Like this:

I pray thee let me go over, and see the good land that is beyond Jordan, that goodly mountain, and Lebanon.—Deut. 3:25.

What a very lovely and interesting view doth this sweet scripture afford of Moses, the man of God! Look at him, my soul, as the Holy Ghost hath here represented him, and pray for grace to gather some of those blessed instructions which this part of his history particularly affords. And what was it made Moses so anxious to go over and see the good land? It was but a type of heaven, even in its highest glory; and surely the type or representation of any thing cannot be equal to the thing itself; and Moses knew, that if he had not the type, he should have the substance: if debarred Canaan, he should be in heaven. There must have been some other cause, which made Moses long for the sight of it. I venture to think, (we may at least conjecture,) and this scripture, I confess, leads me to the idea: “Let me see” (said Moses) “that goodly mountain, and Lebanon.” This was the one hallowed spot Moses longed to see, and to feast his eyes upon. He that had conversed with Jesus at the bush, wanted to behold, and with sacred meditation, by faith, converse with him, on the very spot on which, in after ages, he knew that Jesus would be crucified. He that by faith walked with Jesus, while in Egypt, so as “to esteem the reproach of Christ greater riches than all its treasures,” would there, by faith, have realized the presence of his Lord in sweet communion: and if, through faith, he kept the passover, and the sprinkling of blood, in the ordinance of the paschal lamb, what may we not suppose the man of God would have felt, as he traversed over the sacred goodly mountain and Lebanon? “Here,” he would have said, as he beheld, by faith, the day of Christ afar off, like the patriarch Abraham, “here is the memorable ground, the holy mountain, on which Jesus, my dweller in the bush, will one day make his soul an offering for sin! Here will go up before God the Father that one sacrifice to which all under the law shadowed and ministered, and by which the Lord Jesus will for ever perfect them that are sanctified! Here the Son of God will for ever do away sin by the sacrifice of himself.” O Lebanon! that goodly mountain! for ever sacred to the soul’s meditation of all the redeemed of the Lord Jesus! though, like Moses, I have not trodden thine hallowed ground, yet, by faith, I have seen Jesus in his agonies and passion there; and bless and praise God and the Lamb, for the wonders of redemption. Lord, bring me to the everlasting enjoyment of thy person, work, and righteousness, in glory, for this will be indeed the good land that is beyond Jordan; the goodly mountain, and Lebanon; that “when I awake after thy likeness, I may be satisfied with it.”[1]

Like this:

Hope Is Established by Love

See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. (3:1)

John was overcome with wonder by the fact that sinners by divine grace became God’s children. The opening phrase of this verse, see how great a love, reflects the apostle’s amazement. The word translated see (idete) is both a command and an exclamation that exhorts readers to give close attention to the rest of the statement. How great (potapēn) is a seldom-used term that has no precise parallel in English. Concerning this word, D. Edmond Hiebert wrote,

The adjective rendered “what manner” [“how great”] (potapēn) occurs only seven times in the New Testament and implies a reaction of astonishment, and usually of admiration, upon viewing some person or thing. The expression conveys both a qualitative and quantitative force, “what glorious, measureless love!” (The Epistles of John [Greenville, S.C.: Bob Jones University Press, 1991], 133; cf. Matt. 8:27; 2 Peter 3:11)

God loves believers with a love that is impossible to articulate in any human language and that is utterly foreign to normal human understanding and experience. This is agapē love, God’s volitional love that He, of His own free and uninfluenced choice, has bestowed on all whom He has called to savingly believe in Jesus Christ. The Lord summarized it this way: “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). And later in this letter, John notes,

By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (4:9–10; cf. vv. 16, 19; John 3:16; Rom. 5:8; 8:39; Eph. 2:4; Titus 3:4)

Such love seeks, at a great cost to itself, but only to give freely and spontaneously for the benefit of another, even if that person is not worthy of such an expression (cf. Deut. 7:7–8).

In other words, believers can live in hope because they have experienced God’s love in an eternal, saving way—having been adopted into His family (Rom. 8:16) and called children of God (John 1:12; cf. 2 Peter 1:4). They became His children solely because He lavishly bestowed on them a gracious, unmerited, sovereign love apart from any that has human merit. Such love is inexplicable in human terms. It is not surprising, then, that the world does not know the nature of the relationship between God and His children (cf. Heb. 11:38a), because it did not know Him. Those outside of Christ cannot fathom (1 Cor. 2:15–16; 1 Peter 4:3–4) the true essence and character of believers, which shines forth in their likeness to the heavenly Father and His Son Jesus Christ, their Savior and Lord (Matt. 5:16; Phil. 2:15; 1 Peter 2:12; cf. 1 Cor. 14:24–25). Even for believers it is a challenge “to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge” (Eph. 3:18–19a). Because Christians are so intrinsically different from the world around them, having been transformed by the Father who adopted them, the New Testament appropriately describes them as “strangers and exiles” (Heb. 11:13), “aliens” (1 Peter 1:1), and “aliens and strangers” (1 Peter 2:11). They are those who, in hope, “desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; for He has prepared a city for them” (Heb. 11:16). And having declared them righteous in justification, He is making them righteous in sanctification and will perfect that righteousness in glorification when hope is realized.[1]

3:1 The first three verses of ch. 3 elaborate the status of the person who passes the test of love at 2:29. Childhood has both disadvantages and eschatological benefits. The disadvantages are explored at 3:1 in language that echoes several passages from the fourth gospel, most notably the prologue (Jn 1:1–18) and the farewell (Jn 13–17). Jesus came to his own, but the world did not “know him” (Jn 1:10; 1 Jn 3:1) and does not know his disciples either. Because of this ignorance the world hates God and Jesus and will also hate anyone born of God (Jn 15:18–16:4; 17:14–15). The difficulties this creates for believers are, however, far outweighed by the eschatological benefits of childhood, which John explores in vv. 2–3.[2]

3:1 John now proceeds to bring the ideas of the new birth and the parousia into conjunction with each other. He describes the wonder of the present status of believers as God’s beloved sons, and then comments on their even higher position which is to be revealed at the parousia. This status is no less real for being unrecognized by the sinful world. And the thought of “such amazing bliss” in store for us should not only “constant joys create” but also act as an incentive to holy living.

From the thought of the new birth, then, John’s thought moves to the great love shown by God, as a result of which we have become his children. The train of thought has an interesting parallel in John 3 where the conversation with Nicodemus about the new birth from above through which alone men can enter the kingdom of God is followed by the magnificent declaration of the divine love which sent God’s only Son so that we might have eternal life. John’s appeal to his readers to consider the greatness of God’s love has been lost in the NIV; contrast the TEV, “See how much the Father has loved us!” A slightly unusual word is used to express the sense “how great,”20 and John speaks of the Father “giving” his love, as if it were a gift to be received. The NIV catches the sense well by using the verb “lavished” to express the meaning, but it is perhaps given most felicitously in a Scottish paraphrase, based on a rendering by Isaac Watts:

Behold the amazing gift of love

The Father hath bestowed

On us, the sinful sons of men,

To call us sons of God!

The “love package” contains our title to be called children of God. Jesus promised a blessing for those who make peace: “they will be called sons of God” (Mt. 5:9). This blessing is now generalized, and covers all disciples. (We may legitimately argue in the opposite direction that if all disciples are sons of God, then all disciples ought to be makers of peace.) The picture is that of legitimation: by naming the child as his son, the father acknowledges that it is indeed his child. There is no legal fiction in this. But, lest any readers might draw this false conclusion, John emphasizes that those whom God names as his children really are such. The new birth is a reality. Once again, John is expressing the assurance which believers can possess here and now of their standing in God’s sight.

Because we are God’s children the world does not recognize us, since it did not recognize him either. In fact the world hates the children of God (3:13), just as it hated Jesus (Jn. 15:18f.), since they do not belong to the world. This very fact is a further proof that the readers are children of God: the way in which the world does not recognize them as being on its side is proof that they belong to God. Thus this comment, which at first sight may seem irrelevant, has a part to play in strengthening the readers’ assurance. Christians who are persecuted sometimes feel cut off from God because they are in a difficult and unpleasant situation, and they may be tempted to give up their faith; on the contrary, the very fact that they are being persecuted should strengthen their faith since it is an indication that the evil world recognizes that they have passed from death to life.[3]

3:1 / The idea of being born of God is so inspiring to the Elder that he exclaims (lit.), “Behold! What great love the Father has given to us that we should be called children of God!” He explores this theme for three verses before returning to the contrast between sin and righteousness begun in 2:29.

It is love which has motivated God to claim us as his children. While the two previous references to love (agapē; 2:5, 15) were to human love, this is the first reference to God’s love. (God’s love will be the author’s main focus in 4:7–10, 12, 16–18.) God’s love has been lavished on us. The perfect tense connotes love which has been and continues to be given to us, with the continuing consequence that we are called children of God. People are born into God’s family (2:29; John 1:13) and are given the right to become children of God because they have “received” the Word and have “believed in his name” (John 1:12–13). These are the people for whom Jesus died, including believers from “the Jewish nation,” as well as “the scattered children of God” (future Gentile believers), that he might make them one (John 11:52; 17:20–23; cf. John 10:16). Such people “do what is right” (1 John 2:29) and thereby show that they are in reality what God called them to be (and that is what we are!).

The Elder reinforces the divine origin of the believing community because its status as God’s children is unknown to the world; the surrounding culture does not see it and confirm it. The Johannine Christians must hold on to their true identity “against the stream.” But, in being unknown to the world and in having a secret identity, the community can take special pride, for prior to them Jesus (niv, him) was also “unknown” to his contemporaries John 1:10–11; 8:19; 14:7, 9; 15:18–21; 16:3; cf. 3:32; 4:10; 7:27–28; 14:17; 17:25).[4]

God’s Love

3:1

Children of the heavenly Father

Safely in his bosom gather;

Nestling bird nor star in heaven

Such a refuge e’er was given.

—Carolina V. Sandell Berg

trans. Ernst William Olson

1. How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.

Note the following:

The love of God

In the Greek, John begins this sentence with a command: “See.” He wants the readers to observe the manifestations of the Father’s love. He introduces the subject of the love of God in the preceding chapter (2:5, 15), briefly discusses it in this chapter (3:1, 16, 17), and fully explains it in the next chapter (4:7–9, 10, 12, 16–18). The readers ought to fathom the kind of love the Father gives his children. That love is great. The Greek word translated “how great” or “what kind of” occurs only six times in the New Testament and “always implies astonishment and generally admiration.”

John does not say “the Father loves us.” Then he would describe a condition. Instead, he writes, “the Father has lavished [his love] on us” and thus portrays an action and the extent of God’s love. John has chosen the word Father purposely. That word implies the Father-child relationship. However, God did not become Father when he adopted us as children. God’s fatherhood is eternal. He is eternally the Father of Jesus Christ and through Jesus he is our Father. Through Jesus we receive the Father’s love and are called “children of God.”

Children of God

What an honor! God calls us his children and gives us the assurance that as his children we are heirs and co-heirs with Christ (Rom. 8:17). God gives the right to become children of God (John 1:12) to all who in faith have received Christ as Lord and Savior. God extends his love to his Son Jesus Christ and through him to all his adopted children.

John underscores the reality of our status when he writes that already, at present, we are children of God. “And that is what we are!” In other words, God does not give us a promise which he will fulfill in the future. No, in fact we are already God’s children. We enjoy all the rights and privileges our adoption entails, because we have come to know God as our Father.

Knowledge of God

God’s children experience the love of God. They profess him as their Father, for they have an experiential knowledge of God. They put their trust and faith in him who loves them, provides for them, and protects them.

The hostile, unbelieving world, however, does not know the children of God. Unbelievers cannot understand us, says John, because they do not know God (compare John 16:2–3). “The world does not recognize us because it never recognized him.” The unbelieving world lives separated from God and will never know the significance of our spiritual relationship with God. If we were to become worldly, we would forfeit our status as children of God. By rejecting us, however, the world confirms our relationship with God the Father.[5]

Like this:

“They looked … and behold, the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud.” (Exod. 16:10)

GET into the habit of looking for the silver lining of the cloud and when you have found it, continue to look at it, rather than at the leaden gray in the middle.

Do not yield to discouragement no matter how sorely pressed or beset you may be. A discouraged soul is helpless. He can neither resist the wiles of the enemy himself, while in this state, nor can he prevail in prayer for others.

Flee from every symptom of this deadly foe as you would flee from a viper. And be not slow in turning your back on it, unless you want to bite the dust in bitter defeat.

Search out God’s promises and say aloud of each one: “This promise is mine.” If you still experience a feeling of doubt and discouragement, pour out your heart to God and ask Him to rebuke the adversary who is so mercilessly nagging you.

The very instant you whole-heartedly turn away from every symptom of distrust and discouragement, the blessed Holy Spirit will quicken your faith and inbreathe Divine strength into your soul.

At first you may not be conscious of this, still as you resolutely and uncompromisingly “snub” every tendency toward doubt and depression that assails you, you will soon be made aware that the powers of darkness are falling back.

Oh, if our eyes could only behold the solid phalanx of strength, of power, that is ever behind every turning away from the hosts of darkness, God-ward, what scant heed would be given to the effort of the wily foe to distress, depress, discourage us!

All the marvelous attributes of the Godhead are on the side of the weakest believer, who in the name of Christ, and in simple, childlike trust, yields himself to God and turns to Him for help and guidance.—Selected.

On a day in the autumn, I saw a prairie eagle mortally wounded by a rifle shot. His eye still gleamed like a circle of light. Then he slowly turned his head, and gave one more searching and longing look at the sky. He had often swept those starry spaces with his wonderful wings. The beautiful sky was the home of his heart. It was the eagle’s domain. A thousand times he had exploited there his splendid strength. In those far away heights he had played with the lightnings, and raced with the winds, and now, so far away from home, the eagle lay dying, done to the death, because for once he forgot and flew too low. The soul is that eagle. This is not its home. It must not lose the skyward look. We must keep faith, we must keep hope, we must keep courage, we must keep Christ. We would better creep away from the battlefield at once if we are not going to be brave. There is no time for the soul to stampede. Keep the skyward look, my soul; keep the skyward look!

The United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres is asking for a 10% global tax to fund a ‘dedicated COVID-19 Response and Recovery Fund’.

The bible talks about taxes, and when it does it is nearly always connected to end times events. Daniel 11 tells us that Antichrist will be a ‘raiser of taxes’, and it tells us that at the First Coming of Jesus Christ, there was a global tax in place. So it makes sense that one of the signs connected to His Second Coming, at the end of the time of Jacob’s trouble, will be a global tax as well. The United Nations announced yesterday that in order to ‘deal effectively’ with the global coronavirus pandemic, a global tax of %10, a tithe, needs to be levied. Well, hello Caesar, welcome back!

“And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed. (And this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria.) And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city.” Luke 2:1-3 (KJB)

The idea of a global tax is not new to NTEB readers, click the image below to read our previous article on an idea floated for a global tax back in November of 2019. Of course, a lion’s share of the money, should it be raised, will go to funding ‘sexual reproductive health services’, a Liberal dog whistle for abortion on demand. But can you just imagine what the United Nations would do with $8.7 trillion dollars, or even with one trillion dollars? I can.

“Then shall stand up in his estate a raiser of taxes in the glory of the kingdom: but within few days he shall be destroyed, neither in anger, nor in battle. And in his estate shall stand up a vile person, to whom they shall not give the honour of the kingdom: but he shall come in peaceably, and obtain the kingdom by flatteries.” Daniel 11:20,21 (KJV)

Population control advocate Bill Gates and his eponymous foundation are listed on the UN Sustainable Development ‘partnership platform‘ meaning he gives them untold millions of dollars to ‘carry out the work’. What is some of the ‘work’ Bill Gates is passionate about? Event 201, ID2020, the Certified Mark, and vaccinations that come with a digital ID. Yep, that’s what the United Nations will do with monies raised from a global tax, vaccinate and chip the whole world.

United Nations wants 10% of entire planet’s annual income in fund for coronavirus response

FROM LIFE SITE NEWS: The United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres, has announced the creation of a fund for addressing the global coronavirus pandemic – and he is simultaneously asking nations to contribute the equivalent of at least 10 percent of the annual income of the entire planet to a massive “human-centered, innovative and coordinated stimulus package” that would be administered at the international level. Although Guterres doesn’t state it explicitly, he seems to be connecting the new fund, which he calls a “dedicated COVID-19 Response and Recovery Fund,” with the massive stimulus package plan, announcing both measures in the same press release.

If countries were to accept the plan, the United Nations or some similar coordinating agency would be given the equivalent of approximately 8.7 trillion USD, an unprecedented amount that would be 2,900 times greater than the UN’s annual budget of 3 billion USD.

The proposed plan would effectively place a global agency, presumably the UN itself, in charge of propping up the economies of the world during the coronavirus crisis, placing it in charge of 10% of global income.

Guterres also wants 100 billion USD for the World Health Organization, whose president has been blamed for helping to cause the coronavirus pandemic by repeating in January the Chinese government’s false claim that COVID-19 is not transmissible to humans.

He also wants the same organization to build an “interconnected Global Health Emergency System for data, workforce, and supplies.” Guterres says that the money would be channeled “not only to the business sector and lead firms, but to the workers and SMEs worldwide that underpin the global economy.”

“It is not enough to protect major businesses: we need to protect their suppliers, and the global consumer demand – the household income – that will usher the global economy back to life,” writes Guterres in his report, called “Shared responsibility, global solidarity: Responding to the socio-economic impacts of COVID-19. To be effective, the stimulus package will need to focus on direct and targeted transfer of resources to the most vulnerable households and scaling up health emergency preparedness, social protection, tax abatement, low interest rates, access to credit, insurance and wage support schemes,” he writes.

Among the objectives of the plan, Guterres includes “attention to continued delivery of sexual reproductive health services, such as access to contraceptives without prescription during the crisis.”

“Sexual reproductive health services” are a euphemism often used by international organizations to refer to abortion and contraception.

United Nations and World Health Organization helped to create the pandemic, says expert

Steven Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute, noted that the UN’s World Health Organization (WHO) helped to create the pandemic by repeating communist Chinese government’s false propaganda denying the health risks of COVID-19, and said he was against giving them or the UN in general any additional money for the crisis.

“The UN bureaucracy primarily exists to perpetuate itself and various Left-wing causes that are inimical to liberty and sovereignty,” Mosher told LifeSite. “If the China coronavirus teaches us anything, it is that in moments of global crisis we can only trust our fellow citizens not a distant and detached group of bureaucrats who are better compensated than nearly all Americans.”

He also noted that “reproductive sexual health,” in reality “means forcing contraception, sterilization and abortion on peoples who have not asked for it,” and added that such priorities have left poorer countries unprepared to deal with COVID-19.

“If the clinics in Third World countries had been stocked with medicine instead of abortifacients and contraceptives, they would be better able to cope with the current pandemic,” said Mosher. “In other words, population control programs cost lives.” READ MORE

The shipment includes much-needed ventilators, respirators, masks and other personal protective equipment

Russia sent 60 tons of medical supplies to the United States to help combat the coronavirus after Russian President Vladimir Putin offered them to President Donald Trump when the two spoke on Monday, a senior administration official told DailyMail.com

The supplies landed at John F. Kennedy airport in New York on Wednesday and were criticized on both sides of the Atlantic. American officials questioned Putin’s motives in making the offer and Russian health officials described their own needs for such equipment.

Putin made the offer of help to Trump, who accepted it.

‘President Putin offered President Trump during their conversation Monday,’ a senior Administration official told DailyMail.com.

‘As an act of goodwill, yesterday, Russia delivered a planeload of equipment and supplies at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. Likewise, the United States is sending equipment and supplies to many other countries, and will continue to do more as we are able,’ the official said.

The cargo plane carried 60 tons of ventilators, masks, respirators and protective equipment at a time when the United States is struggling to meet the demands of health care workers who are on the frontline.

‘Russia sent us a very, very large planeload of things, medical equipment, which was very nice,’ President Trump told reporters at the White House Monday during his daily press briefing.

Like this:

April 2.—Morning. [Or July 2.]
“Is not the Lord gone out before thee?”

Judges 4:1–23

AND the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord, when Ehud was dead. (That sentence, “the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord,” comes over and over again so often that it seems to be the only invariable fact in their history. Would not such words frequently occur in our biographies if they could be fully written?)

2 And the Lord sold them into the hand of Jabin king of Canaan, that reigned in Hazor; the captain of whose host was Sisera, which dwelt in Harosheth of the Gentiles.

3 And the children of Israel cried unto the Lord; for he had nine hundred chariots of iron; and twenty years he mightily oppressed the children of Israel. (When we read of Israel crying, we know that deliverance will come. Prayer has mercy at its heels.)

4 ¶ And Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth, she judged Israel at that time.

God uses all classes and both sexes for his work. In this case a man plays a very secondary part, and two women share the honour. One strikes the first blow, and the other the last. Although women do not go out into public preaching, or to fight in the open field like Barak, they can do much at home with the tent-pin of personal address, and in society by encouraging the soldiers of the Lord.

5 And she dwelt under the palm tree of Deborah between Ramah and Beth-el in mount Ephraim: and the children of Israel came up to her for judgment.

6, 7 And she sent and called Barak the son of Abinoam out of Kedesh-naphtali, and said unto him, Hath not the Lord God of Israel commanded, saying, Go and draw toward mount Tabor, and take with thee ten thousand men of the children of Naphtali and of the children of Zebulun? And I will draw unto thee to the river Kishon Sisera, the captain of Jabin’s army, with his chariots and his multitude; and I will deliver him into thine hand.

The Lord has not only leading strings to draw his people, but fatal cords with which to draw his foes whithersoever he wills.

8 And Barak said unto her, If thou wilt go with me, then I will go: but if thou wilt not go with me, then I will not go.

9 And she said, I will surely go with thee: notwithstanding the journey that thou takest shall not be for thine honour; for the Lord shall sell Sisera into the hand of a woman. And Deborah arose, and went with Barak to Kedesh. (He had not faith enough to go alone, and therefore, though he won the battle, he had not the honour of the victory. We lose much when we lean upon an arm of flesh. At the same time he showed a noble spirit in entering upon a conflict in which another was to receive the chief honour.)

10 ¶ And Barak called Zebulun and Naphtali to Kedesh; and he went up with ten thousand men at his feet: and Deborah went up with him. (Many good men only need a call from some brave leader, and they will rally to the standard. God has his ten thousands in our Israel yet. O for the man and the hour! Rather, O for the Lord’s own Spirit to call us to the combat!)

11 Now Heber the Kenite, which was of the children of Hobab the father in law of Moses, had severed himself from the Kenites, and pitched his tent unto the plain of Zaanaim, which is by Kedesh.

12 And they shewed Sisera that Barak the son of Abinoam was gone up to mount Tabor.

13 And Sisera gathered together all his chariots, even nine hundred chariots of iron, and all the people that were with him, from Harosheth of the Gentiles unto the river of Kishon.

Little dreamed he when he sallied forth in his pride that he was being lured to his destruction. Some trust in horses, and some in chariots, but vain are such defences against the Lord of hosts.

14 And Deborah said unto Barak, Up; for this is the day in which the Lord hath delivered Sisera into thine hand: is not the Lord gone out before thee? So Barak went down from mount Tabor, and ten thousand men after him.

The word of Deborah sharpened the sword of Barak. Holy women often encourage the Lord’s ministers.

15 And the Lord discomfited Sisera, and all his chariots, and all his host, with the edge of the sword before Barak; (The Lord did it, Barak was but the sword in his hand.)

16 But Barak pursued after the chariots, and after the host, unto Harosheth of the Gentiles: and all the host of Sisera fell upon the edge of the sword; and there was not a man left.

God’s sword never misses one whom he means to smite. This is fatal news for the impenitent.

17 Howbeit Sisera fled away on his feet to the tent of Jael the wife of Heber the Kenite: for there was peace between Jabin the king of Hazor and the house of Heber the Kenite.

18 ¶ And Jael went out to meet Sisera, and said unto him, Turn in, my lord, turn in to me; fear not. And when he had turned in unto her into the tent, she covered him with a mantle.

19 And he said unto her, Give me, I pray thee, a little water to drink; for I am thirsty. And she opened a bottle of milk, and gave him drink, and covered him.

20 Again he said unto her, Stand in the door of the tent, and it shall be, when any man doth come and enquire of thee, and say, Is there any man here? that thou shalt say, No.

This instruction was very like the shameful custom which is so common, for servants to be ordered to say, “my mistress is not at home,” when she is in the house all the time. Let not Christians borrow lying habits from heathens.

21 Then Jael Heber’s wife took a nail of the tent, and took an hammer in her hand, and went softly unto him, and smote the nail into his temples, and fastened it into the ground: for he was fast asleep and weary. So he died.

This would have been a dastardly action had she been moved by motives of gain, but as an act in which she became the executioner of a man condemned of God, and the slayer of the great enemy of her adopted country, her conduct is rightly praised. The patriotic heroine recognized in the fugitive the enemy of her God and of his people, and her eye had no pity, neither did her hand spare him.

22 And, behold, as Barak pursued Sisera, Jael came out to meet him, and said unto him, Come, and I will shew thee the man whom thou seekest. And when he came into her tent, behold, Sisera lay dead, and the nail was in his temples. (So the proud tyrant was disgraced as well as killed. Somewhere or other God has feeble instruments who will be made wise to put down error, and drive a nail through the head of false doctrine. O Lord, arise and plead thine own cause.)

23 So God subdued on that day Jabin the king of Canaan before the children of Israel.

O God, be thou no longer still,

Thy foes are leagued against thy law;

Make bare thine arm on Zion’s hill,

Great Captain of our Holy War.

As Amalek and Ishmael

Had war for ever with thy seed,

So all the hosts of Rome and hell

Against thy Son their armies lead.

By Kishon’s brook all Jabin’s band

At thy rebuke were swept away;

O Lord, display thy mighty hand,

A single stroke shall win the day.

O glorious hour! O blest abode!

I shall be near and like my God;

And flesh and sin no more control

The sacred pleasures of my soul.

My flesh shall slumber in the ground,

’Till the last trumpet’s joyful sound;

Then burst the chains with sweet surprise,

And in my Saviour’s image rise.

Sleep not, soldier of the Cross!

Foes are lurking all around;

Look not here to find repose:

This is but thy battle ground.

Up! and take thy shield and sword;

Up! it is the call of heaven:

Shrink not faithless from thy Lord;

Nobly strive as he hath striven.

To the God of all creation

Let us sing with cheerful voice

In the Rock of our salvation

Let us heartily rejoice.

In his presence let us gather

With glad hearts and thankful lays,

And to God, our heavenly Father,

Show our joy with psalms of praise.

He is King among all nations,

God above all gods is he;

In his hand are earth’s foundations,

The strong hills and rolling sea.

He created land and ocean,

He with beauty clothes the sod;

Let us kneel in deep devotion,

Bless our Maker and our God.

April 2.—Evening. [Or July 3.]
“Lead thy captivity captive.”

WE shall now hear Deborah sing her right noble poem of victory. She was both prophetess and poetess. All powers of poetry should be consecrated to the honour of God who bestows them.

Judges 5:1–18

1, 2 Then sang Deborah and Barak the son of Abinoam on that day, saying, Praise ye the Lord for the avenging of Israel, when the people willingly offered themselves. (Unto God all the praise is given. The people were willing, but God made their zealous valour to be successful.)

3 Hear, O ye kings; give ear, O ye princes; I, even I, will sing unto the Lord; I will sing praise to the Lord God of Israel. (To such a woman, upon such a theme, the loftiest monarchs might wisely listen.)

4, 5 Lord, when thou wentest out of Seir, when thou marchedst out of the field of Edom, the earth trembled, and the heavens dropped, the clouds also dropped water. The mountains melted from before the Lord, even that Sinai from before the Lord God of Israel. (All the kings around are bidden to remember the glorious marching of Jehovah, when he led his people from Egypt to Canaan; even on the road to battle the Lord displayed the glory of his majesty.)

6, 7 In the days of Shamgar the son of Anath, in the days of Jael, the highways were unoccupied, and the travellers walked through byways. (Trade and travelling were at an end, for the country was unsafe.) The inhabitants of the villages ceased, they ceased in Israel, until that I Deborah arose, that I arose a mother in Israel. (Husbandry could not be carried on, the people fled to the walled towns for fear.)

8 They chose new gods; then was war in the gates: was there a shield or spear seen among forty thousand in Israel? (On account of Israel’s idolatry, they had become so reduced, and their oppressors had so completely disarmed them, that they had no fit weapons for war.)

9 My heart is toward the governors of Israel, that offered themselves willingly among the people. Bless ye the Lord. (It is indeed a blessing when the governors lead the way in good things.)

10 Speak, ye that ride on white asses, ye that sit in judgment, and walk by the way.

Justice could not be dispensed, civil affairs were all unhinged, no one was safe, but Deborah and Barak changed the scene.

11 They that are delivered from the noise of archers in the places of drawing water, there shall they rehearse the righteous acts of the Lord, even the righteous acts toward the inhabitants of his villages in Israel: then shall the people of the Lord go down to the gates.

In times of peace, when no robber was to be feared at the well, this song of gratitude would be sung, and the Lord would be praised.

13 Then he made him that remaineth have dominion over the nobles among the people: the Lord made me have dominion over the mighty. (God put Deborah first as ruler, but she did not fail to make honourable mention of all who shared in the fight, nor afterwards to rebuke those who shunned it.)

14, 15 Out of Ephraim was there a root of them against Amalek; after thee, Benjamin, among thy people; out of Machir came down governors, and out of Zebulun they that handle the pen of the writer. And the princes of Issachar were with Deborah; even Issachar, and also Barak: he was sent on foot into the valley. For the divisions of Reuben there were great thoughts of heart.

16 Why abodest thou among the sheepfolds, to hear the bleatings of the flocks? For the divisions of Reuben there were great searchings of heart. (Divided in council and indolent in spirit, Reuben lent no assistance. This was a sad business.)

17 Gilead abode beyond Jordan: and why did Dan remain in ships? Asher continued on the sea shore, and abode in his breaches.

Some with no excuse, and others with a bad excuse, refrained from the patriotic war, and missed its glories. How disgraceful not to do their utmost in such a cause. Lord, save us from cowardice and slothfulness, and let us rather be such bold, self-sacrificing spirits as those the poet sings of in the next verse.

18 Zebulun and Naphtali were a people that jeoparded their lives unto the death in the high places of the field. (Here we are compelled to make a break, until our next reading.)[1]